Beatles Quotes

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup... Quotes from and about The Beatles.

[beatlequotes]

“Kurt [Cobain] loved The Beatles because it was just so simple. Well, it seemed simple. They sound easy to play, but you know what? They’re f****** hard.”

- Dave Grohl, 2012

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“When I was young, that’s how I learned how to play music — I had a guitar and a Beatles songbook. I would listen to the records and play along. Of course, it didn’t sound like The Beatles, but it got me to understand song structure and melody and harmony and arrangement. […]

“I never had a teacher — I just had these Beatles records.Even in Nirvana — The Beatles [were] such a huge influence.”

- Dave Grohl, 2012

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“Yes, growing old. I hate the thought of that. Who’d want to hear a croaking Beatle of 80?”

— John Lennon, answering the question: “Do you have a pet fear?” in 16 Magazine, June 1964.

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“First, of course, the crowds at the airport and the hotel. But discovering that you have TV 24 hours a day really flipped me.”

— Paul McCartney, answering the question “What impressed you about New York”, in 16 Magazine, June 1964

[beatlequotes]

“We filmed at Teddington Studios and the girls were waiting there from Saturday night for them to arrive. They came up the river in a boat then we had an open car to take them into the studio. As they got in, a girl got out of the crowd and threw herself inside the car. I said to her, “Why are you here?” She said, “We want to breathe the same air they are.””

— Lionel Blair, talking about the making of A Hard Days Night

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“I was just sitting there in that bare room, thinking of John and realising I’d lost him. And it was a powerful loss, so to have a conversation with him in a song was some form of solace. Somehow I was with him again.”

- Paul McCartney, on writing ‘Here Today’, The Lyrics.

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“‘What about the night we cried?’ That was in Key West, on our first major tour to the US, when there was a hurricane coming in and we couldn’t play a show in Jacksonville. We had to lie low for a couple of days, and we were in our little Key West motel room, and we got very drunk and cried about how much we loved each other.”

- Paul McCartney, on ‘Here Today’, The Lyrics

[beatlequotes]

“They called us ‘Mersey Beat’ - which took its name from a local entertainment paper - and we thought, ‘Well, bloody hell. That’s so corny.’”

- Paul McCartney, The Lyrics

[beatlequotes]

“Paul wrote ‘Two Of Us’ on one of those days out. It’s about us. We just pulled off in a wood somewhere and parked the car. I went off walking while Paul sat in the car and started writing. He also mentions the postcards because we used to send a lot of postcards to each other.

“As a kid, I loved getting lost.I would say to my father – let’s get lost. But you could never seem to be able to get really lost. All signs would eventually lead back to New York or wherever we were staying! Then, when I moved to England to be with Paul, we would put Martha in the back of the car and drive out of London. As soon as we were on the open road I’d say, ‘Let’s get lost’ and we’d keep driving without looking at any signs. Hence the line in the song, ‘Two of us going nowhere’.”

- Linda McCartney, quoted in A Hard Days Night by Steve Turner

[beatlequotes]

“James Brown did it in 1972, he redid ‘Think’ as a single, and on the B-side he did ‘Something’ which is fantastic. I’ve got it on my jukebox at home and I mean it is just unbelievable, the way he sings it, and the arrangement is really beautiful.”

- George Harrison, discussing James Brown’s cover of Something, 1979

[beatlequotes]

“Actually, when I was writing that song, in my mind I was thinking of Ray Charles singing it. As it happened, the song ended up with over 150 cover versions, but when Ray Charles did it, I was really disappointed, except for the middle, the bridge to it, he sings great. But it was a bit of a corny sort of way he did it.”

- George Harrison, discussing Ray Charles’ cover of Something, 1979

[beatlequotes]

“I always knew that if I was going to do anything and be taken seriously in my life, I had to work and work very, very hard. Because you can get a foot in the door by being George Harrison's son, but you can't stay there. […]

“Everyone's looking at me thinking, 'He's got it handed to him on a plate; he got that because of his dad.'

“So if you do well they curse you, and if you do badly they curse you.”

- Dhani Harrison

[beatlequotes]

“I did rebel. I was the rebel in my family, because my dad wanted me to go and just travel with him. My dad would be like, 'Sod your exams – let's go to the South Pacific.'

“You don't have to burn books, you don't have to rebel against teachers to rebel; to rebel is to truly own your own self. Rebelling in my family was going and getting on the river [he was a member of the famous Henley-based Leander rowing club] and doing courses and getting your grades.”

- Dhani Harrison

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“My dad used to say to me, 'You look more like me than I do.' You know, it's exactly the best and worst thing about every day – comforting and sad all at the same time.”

- Dhani Harrison, 2012

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“It’s amazing. Sometimes in the past, a few years ago, it can be [sic] difficult, it can be tense, like families can get. But beyond that it's beautiful.

“He’s a genius, he's beyond genius, and he's a big inspiration. Very intellectual and amazing at what he does, so it's great fun.”

- James McCartney, on his relationship with his father.

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“Dad recorded an album during the last lockdown. He would spend the day working on a song, then come back and I'd cook dinner and we would eat together. It was brilliant.

“He'd play the song that he'd been working on, and he also asked me to take pictures for the album. It's great.”

- Mary McCartney, on how she and her father, Paul spent the 2020 lockdown

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“How sweet is that? I am totally thrilled and deeply touched by this. It's really fun having him on the bus. It's nice to have some quality time with him. None of my friends are willing to rough it on the tour bus, so I am very impressed.”

- Sean Lennon, on how Julian Lennon joined him on tour (unannounced) in 2008.